Group on July 7th 2016

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We began with a Mountain Meditation taken from Jon Kabat-Zinn.

This was followed by enquiry followed by a larger enquiry concerning how people were in a period of intense political & emotional turmoil and the place of mindfulness practice in the midst of this. There was discussion around the primary need for personal stability and emotional safety and the importance of a sense of connection with others as well as a personal sense of control through basic lifestyle choices such as a good diet, adequate sleep and exercise. Usual mindfulness practices may need to be changed or adapted rather then struggled with - being flexible and self-compassionate helping to reduce that tendency to negative self-judgement.

Working with difficult emotions was discussed - such emotions are to be acknowledged and their expression can be healing (as with extreme sadness). Of interest, in 'A Force for Good - The Dalai Lama's vision for Our World', Dan Goleman describes how the Dalai Lama advises "well-guided anger" where one will, "Keep a calm mind, study the situation, then take a countermeasure. If you let a wrongdoing happen, it might continue abd increase, so, out of compassion, take appropriate countermeasures." "Muscular compassion" is the term Dan Goleman gives to this approach by the Dalai Lama to wrongdoing in the world. 

For all of us, simply taking a breath or a space to help with our tendency for emotional reactivity & unthinking behaviour is the first step to wiser and kinder action - however small - or great - the context may be. 

There was some discussion around the 'rightness' of using distraction at times of strong emotion and stress. We try to use our thinking minds to solve emotional states and often this just makes things worse. So, when dealing with difficult mind states, a meditation practice where we set the mind on something else like the breath or the body can open up a spaciousness around the thinking and loosen it up. Equally, simply taking a walk or doing some gardening or going for a swim will take the focus from the tyrannical thinking mind and into the body and its connection with the space and environment surrounding it. 

We concluded this session with the poem 'The Garden' by Harry Clifton (from 'Being Human' edited by Neil Astley).